


Kocham Cię

by Mandolin77



Series: Loving a Damned Soul [1]
Category: Trusty Bell: Chopin no Yume | Eternal Sonata
Genre: Canon Related, Child Death, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Past Character Death, real world fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-23
Updated: 2015-10-23
Packaged: 2018-04-27 18:50:09
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,302
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5059996
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mandolin77/pseuds/Mandolin77
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Fryderyk was finally dying, after all the years of surpassing his life-expectancy, and Ludwika felt as though some mornings found her cracking under the pressures of loving a damned soul.  She would do anything for him, more than ready to return the favors he had blessed her with so many times, but there was nothing to do except watch as his face twisted and shrank beneath the pain of the mortal world, his body wasting away in preparation to pass into another realm.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Kocham Cię

Ludwika stood at the window, a shawl wrapped around her shoulders as she gazed out at the storm clouds brewing beyond the horizon, beautiful against the almost-midnight darkness. Fryderyk had been asleep most of the day, still trying to recover from the physician’s earlier visit. Her poor brother had been plagued by physicians for years, and he had confessed to her in a letter that her presence would help him far more than any doctor ever could—but he had been willing to brave another onslaught of tests if it would please her.

Her eyes burned at the thought. He would do anything to please those he loved, and now here they were, in a rented French apartment that was far too big and far too empty for all those who loved him now. Fryderyk was finally dying, after all the years of surpassing his life-expectancy, and Ludwika felt as though some mornings found her cracking under the pressures of loving a damned soul. She would do anything for him, more than ready to return the favors he had blessed her with so many times, but there was nothing to do except watch as his face twisted and shrank beneath the pain of the mortal world, his body wasting away in preparation to pass into another realm.

There was the sound of rustling sheets behind her, and Ludwika turned to see her brother staring at the roses on the table beside his bed, head turned slightly as though in examination of some exquisite piece of artwork. Time seemed to slow for a moment and he looked almost well again, lost in the beauty of nature the way he lost himself in music. Ludwika held her breath, afraid to break whatever spell had been cast over their room, and his thin lips twisted up into a smile as he looked up at her, slowly against the light. It was the fever that made his dark eyes so wide and so bright, but she chose to believe that it was the splendor of the roses instead—the same way she chose to believe that the edges of his smile were soft and genuine instead of the wry, self-mocking gesture she knew it to be. In either case it was gone again as soon as it had come, and Fryderyk sank back against the pillows and Ludwika had to swallow back more tears. She wasn’t going to cry.

He seemed to know this, seemed to sense her brokenness because at that moment he stretched out one hand and she tripped over her skirts to reach him. “My dear sister… my dear, dear sister. How much I’ve missed you.”

She took his hand and raised it to her lips, kissing the back of each cold finger gently before she wound them in amongst her own. “I have been here.”

He smiled again, reaching out his other hand to embrace her, and Ludwika sat down on the edge of the mattress beside him. “Yes, of course. Even in my sleep I could feel your spirit around me.”

“You give me too much credit,” she murmured, brushing her thumb across his knuckles. “How are you feeling?”

“Fatigued,” he admitted, and allowed his smile to slip slightly as she squeezed his hand. “Where… where are the others?”

“I sent them all to bed. They have been keeping vigil since yesterday night.” She paused and added, “Do you want me to fetch them?”

He shook his head and Ludwika shifted towards him, heavy skirts rustling as she moved. “No. They–” he stopped, teeth grit against a surge of pain. “They need rest.”

“Fryderyk?” He shook his head again and she leaned over him, brushing damp hair out of his eyes.

“It’s fine,” he gasped, long fingers clutching hers, and she had a sudden, vivid memory of playing four-hand together, those same long fingers dancing across the keyboard and making music as they went. She’d apologized once because her skills were so abysmal when compared to his: she felt he deserved to play with someone of his own caliber. He’d only laughed and told her it was fine, it was fine, the same way he was telling her now.

Ludwika bent her head lower, loose curls falling free of her bun, and kissed his sunken cheek with infinite gentleness. She could not imagine how that young, gay man had become the stranger lying before her. “Try to breathe, brother. It will be over soon.”

He nodded weakly and she kissed him again, feeling him shaking under her grasp. “It’s fine,” he said again, as if to assure her. She blinked tears back out of her eyes.

“I know it is,” she whispered with a tiny smile. “You are so very, very brave, Fryderyk. Just try to breathe.”

The room was silent for a long minute, and Ludwika held him while he took quiet, panting breaths, squeezing his eyes shut against the world outside. He was in pain, and it made her chest ache to know that he was in pain and she could do nothing to help him. She was his big sister; she was supposed to be his rescuer, his protector, and she was _helpless_ in the face of this brutish disease.

“I love you,” he choked out, and turned his head until he could brush his lips across the palm of her hand.

“As I love you, Fryderyk.”

“ _Kocham ci_ _ę_ _._ ”

She pulled her skirts onto the bed and lay down beside him, curling up with one arm beneath his pillow to support his head. He leaned towards her, cheek resting on her bosom, and she swallowed hard and carded her fingers through his dark, sweat-damp hair. “ _Kocham ci_ _ę_ ,” she agreed. “Very, very much.”

He sighed softly, the barest of smiles turning up his lips. His nightshirt was open, unbuttoned down to the center of his chest, and she could count each individual rib bone as they fell with the sound. “I… dreamed.”

She tightened her arms around him, the doctor’s words crashing through her head— _It is said that people can have the most peaceful dreams just before they pass on_. “Are you feeling alright?”

“There was a little girl,” he continued, almost as though he hadn’t heard her. “An angel. And she… she looked like Emilia.” He closed his eyes, and a sound like a sob bubbled up in his throat. “She looked like Emilia before she was sick.”

“Emilia was a beautiful child,” Ludwika whispered, holding Fryderyk to her breast. He nodded blindly.

“She was. In—in the dream. She was beautiful.”

“Did she speak to you?” There were wet streaks shining on his cheeks as he nodded again, and she turned her face up to the ceiling and prayed silently for strength. He had never said it out loud, but Ludwika knew how much her brother missed their youngest sister… how much her death had truly scarred him.

“She said that she had been waiting for me,” he mumbled, and Ludwika wrapped her arms around him as her own tears finally spilled over. She hadn’t wanted to cry. “And—I told her that I would be there soon.”

“No,” Ludwika said softly. “Fryderyk, no. You must stay with me.”

“Emilia–”

“Emilia’s dead.” She had never spoken the words out loud before, and it felt like a relief and a betrayal all at once to finally admit that Emilia was _dead._ She was not absent or passed on or in a better place. She was dead and buried alone in a tiny wooden casket, rotting quietly beneath a gravestone— _Like a flower in which blossomed the beautiful promise of fruit._

Fryderyk didn’t make a sound, the pain—and he had _so much pain_ —overwhelming him the point of silence. He had loved their sister desperately. They had all loved her, of course, each in their own fashion, and they had been there for her up until the very end, but Fryderyk had never quite gotten over the fact that she was gone. Their dear brother had a habit of giving his heart away, utterly and entirely, and it made him beautiful just as much as it made him weak.

The doctors had diagnosed him with Pulmonary Tuberculosis, but Ludwika knew his real condition. If he died, it would be of one too many broken hearts.

She bent towards him a little more until his feet were tangled in the skirt of her dress, choking back selfish and sympathetic tears. She wanted him to never die, and at the same time, horribly, she hoped his lungs would give in soon so that it could all be over. He was her family, her best friend, a child that she had helped to raise from infancy and who had, in turn, helped to raise her. They had hurried home to recount their first loves together—first kisses, first heartaches, first pains—and many, many nights had found them talking deep into the morning about their secret wishes and prayers, what they hoped for the future and what they remembered from the past. Even when he’d been gone they had written letters back and forth, pages long with slanted writing on both sides. Even when he’d been gone he had still, in a way, been there.

And now he was leaving her, once and for all. This would be his final voyage, a journey that millions of brave men had taken before him, and he was never coming back.

She kissed his pale lips gently, brushing them with her own as if he might break. His breath smelled sour, like milk that had been left out too long, and she realized, abruptly, that she missed her brother. She _missed_ her brother—the scent of his cologne and the sound of his laughter and the feel of his arms when he hugged her, and it occurred to her that she would never experience those things again.

He was never coming back.

Something like grief crashed over her, a sudden and frightening emotion that stuck in her throat like unshed tears. It blurred her eyes and constricted her chest, and she realized she was mourning for a man who lived still, a man who was clinging to life in her arms. She sobbed out loud and hugged him again.

“I love you so much,” she whispered, her voice as absolutely broken as the tiny, withered body she was holding to her breast. “I love you _so very_ much.” 

“I will miss you,” he answered hoarsely, and turned so that she could see his faint smile. Something in her chest tightened to the point of unbearable pain.

“Please, Fryderyk. Please don't leave me.”

She knew that she might burn in hell for an eternity and _deserve_ it, if only for the way she could watch her baby brother suffer and still think only of herself—but the heart was a fickle, narcissistic thing, and it was her heart that was forming the words.

“Ludwika...”

“You can fight this,” she breathed. “You can. Forget this death and come back to me.”

“Forget this death,” he mused softly, his eyes unfocused and full of unspoken pain. “My sister... my sister. I tried.” He paused for a long moment, and then his lips turned up one more time in a way that was wholly unlike a smile. “I cannot forget her.”

Ludwika winced inwardly, closing her eyes. She knew what he meant, but she had to ask anyway because his words would haunt her forever if she did not. “You mean Emilia?”

“Yes.”

They sat in silence for a moment, and when Ludwika finally managed to open her eyes again Fryderyk was looking over her shoulder at something she would never see.

“Was she very happy?” Ludwika asked suddenly, fingers curling around the back of his neck. She wasn’t sure what the dream meant, but for some reason she wanted to know anyway, as though their sister’s happiness could make up for their current pain.

“She was lonely…” he whispered, “but I think she was happy still. She was happy to see me.”

She focused on the ceiling again, her eyes tired and blurred enough to make shapes out of nothing until the white plaster seemed full of angels and devils all waiting to take her brother away. “Good. That’s good.”

“She said she had missed me,” Fryderyk said, his voice so soft that the words seemed like a confession. Ludwika rubbed one strong hand across his shoulder, wincing a little at the feel of sharp bones shuddering beneath her touch. “That she had been waiting for so many years to see me again.”

“Did you still recognize her?”

“Yes.” He nodded a little against her chest. “Always.”

She wondered at this answer— _always_ —and wondered if she would remember his face when they met in the afterlife. She glanced down to where his tears were slowly drying and tried to commit to memory her brother’s gaunt features: the high brow and prominent nose, the soft curve of cheekbones that arced down into hollow spaces where his body used to be. His hair had thinned and grayed in the last few years, but it still held some of the delicate curls of his boyhood that she had loved so much when he was a child.

“Always,” she said again, and pressed her nose into the space beneath his ear. Even his ears, they said, showed evidence of consumptives. “Fryderyk, I will always know you.”

“Yes,” he answered. There was no question in his voice, no uncertainty at the sudden change of subject as he turned his face to brush against hers. “I love you, sister.”

“I love you,” she repeated. “I love you.” And the tears drowned out whatever else she had wanted to say.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Ludwika is Frederic's sister, the dark-haired woman we see at his bedside in the real world cut-scenes. She left her home and her family and moved to Paris to take care of him before his death. Kocham Cię translates from Polish as 'I love you.'


End file.
